Study follows young offenders’ progress

A University of Missouri researcher who developed a treatment for juvenile offenders has found that the program has long-lasting effects.

Charles Borduin, professor of psychological sciences in the College of Arts and Science, followed up with participants who completed Multisystemic Therapy 22 years earlier. MST is a program aimed at preventing serious mental health problems in children and teens through family intervention and therapist feedback.

Borduin located records for more than 80 percent of the 176 teens who participated in a MST trial between 1983 and 1986. He found the following differences:

Since completing the treatment, 4.3 percent of the former teens treated with MST were arrested for a violent felony compared to 15.5 percent of individual therapy participants.

Individual therapy participants were involved in family-related civil suits twice as often as MST participants.

“The research shows that Multisystemic Therapy has long-lasting effects,” Borduin said in a statement. “Nearly 22 years after treatment, juvenile offenders treated with MST still see positive effects. This treatment has protected many potential victims, and I hope this research helps to encourage further use of the method.”

MST is used in 34 states and 12 countries, including Norway, where it is the national model for juvenile offender treatment. The recent study is one of the longest post-treatment period follow-ups ever conducted for psychological evidence-based treatment, Borduin said.

The findings were recently published in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology.